The Only Way They Know How
by kaiserklee
Summary: Junko loves her classmates, each and every one. Mukuro feels the same.
1. Enoshima Junko

**The Only Way They Know How**

Enoshima Junko really does love her classmates.

What she feels for them is a _conditional _love, but it's still love. It's conditional because she doesn't _always _love them, but she does, sometimes. They're classmates who have spent an entire two years together, so of course she loves them. How could she _not _love them? They are almost as dear to her as Super Duper High School Disappointment Ikusaba Mukuro, but not really because dear Mukuro-neechan is her twin and still so disappointing and that gives her wonderful, wonderful despair the likes of which no one else can ever give her.

The others come close though. They come _real _close.

Junko feels the most love for her classmates when they show her despair, because they do it better than anyone.

Super Duper High School Spineless, Naegi Makoto, whose face crinkles into such beautiful agony whenever he realizes he's just not good enough and his good luck just isn't the same as the others' talents. The way his person wilts like a dying leaf and the way his eyes grow dull like a dead fish makes Junko tremble with ecstasy. Disappointment likes him, too. Double points for Spineless, since Mukuro should only ever love Junko alone, and the knowledge that she does not any longer is even more despair.

Super Duper High School Stick Up His Ass, Togami Byakuya, whose poise and mask shatters like porcelain whenever he falls asleep and his guard is down. Junko wakes up in the middle of the night and turns to see the boy crying in his sleep, weeping over some dead siblings like it's really a big deal, and the sight makes her come harder than the boy can while awake.

Super Duper High School Loudmouth, Oowada Mondo, whose secret isn't a secret to someone like Junko. All it takes for the big, bad man to despair is Junko walking by and whispering to Mukuro, very loudly, oh Mukuro-neechan, do you love me enough to throw yourself in front of a truck for me, you're the bestest best big sister ever, and _crack_ goes his knuckles against a wall.

Super Duper High School Surprisingly Buff, Ishimaru Kiyotaka, whose obsession with the rules is so much fun Junko goes with the easy route and spikes his drink. When he wakes up with Mondo in tangled sheets, he isn't upset about having slept with someone while drunk, he's upset because he drank while underaged, and Junko is awed because she had not been expecting _that._

Super Duper High School Schizo, Fukawa Touko, whose love for her Byakuya-sama, the White Knight, is borderline-stalkerish. Of course she notices, when Togami has so many hickeys his skin is mottled. Junko rubs salt into the wound by keeping the door open just a tiny bit and screaming the boy's name like a prayer, Togami, Togami, Togami, and outside Fukawa hears.

Super Duper High School Steroids, Oogami Sakura, whose so-called pride in her freakish build is really just justification for how she's ruined herself. Junko watches Brainless comfort her, try to lie that yes, one day that boy you like will maybe overlook your freaky muscles, but both of them know that's a shitty lie. Junko smiles when Oogami breaks down and screams.

Super Duper High School Brainless, Asahina Aoi, whose bubbly face makes Junko want to gag but whose pain is all the more delicious for it. Junko comforts her after she's done comforting the Ogre, tells her that maybe one day Muscles will love you back, but oh wait, you're not really her type, you're too skinny, eat more. Asahina stuffs herself until she throws it back up.

Super Duper High School Confused, Fujisaki Chihiro, whose skinny legs and pretty face make him so female he wants to be one, disguises himself as one. But whenever he showers, Junko knows he sees something dangling in between his legs that he hates. Junko walks by and asks, oh Chihiro-chan, how do you keep your legs that smooth, and he runs off with trembling lips.

Super Duper High School Twilight Fan, Celestia Ludenberg, whose badly-done, caked-on and flaking makeup makes Junko want to wash it all off and start over, because that girl just does not know how to do it right. She's so ugly Junko feels despair just looking at her, and added to the weird delusions of grandeur, it's almost too much all at once.

Super Duper High School Prone to Heart Disease, Yamada Hifumi, whose denial of attraction to the real world (the 3D-world, he calls it, like the 2D-world is the real one instead) is to hide his obsession not with hentai but with a real-life vampire goth loli. Whenever he sneakily touches himself in the library while looking at Buko, he's thinking of Celes, and Junko loves it.

Super Duper High School Off-Key, Maizono Sayaka, whose fame could only have come from her shitty voice moaning, her shitty dance leg-spreading. Junko whispers to her in a conspiratory tone that, did you hear, so and so idol was found to have been sleeping with her manager, but_you _would never need to, you're so talented, and Maizono excuses herself looking quite sick.

Super Duper High School Dreadlocks, Hagakure Yasuhiro, well…Junko doesn't actually love him. He's a little too gross, and even when he despairs, it's not really despair but some sorta weird gross icky thing, so Junko just sort of tries to forget he exists. She supposes he gives her despair too, by just breathing and walking around for as long as he has.

Super Duper High School Wannabe, Kuwata Leon, whose bravado is really quite real because he thinks he's all that, and Junko lets him indulge for a little bit, lets him think he's a real man while she pretends like she enjoys his clumsy touch. Then she turns the tables and it's the whips and the chains and the blades, and she enjoys his whimpering a whole lot more.

And finally, Junko's absolute favorite. Oh, how she loves and hates Super Duper High School Daddy's Girl, Kirigiri Kyouko. Where to even _begin_. So much teen angst in that girl, and for all her precocious intelligence, _almost_ a match for Junko herself, her brain is still stuck in that stupid mix between love and rebellion. So, Junko does her a favor. She sticks Kyouko's daddy in a spaceship and launches him up, so Kyouko won't have to worry about conflicting feelings anymore. Junko wishes she could walk up and say, here Kyouko, it's your dad in a box, just like you always wanted! But it's almost as good to let her find the bones herself, so that's fine too.

Junko loves all her classmates, so, _so _much, so much it makes her sick with love and there's so much love she despairs from it, because she fucking hates love. That's why she decides to give her love back to her classmates. For showing her so much love, she must love them back. Love is despair, and despair is love, so when the others show her love, she'll show them despair in return. Junko will give her love to her classmates by forcing them into a life of mutual killing.

That's the only way she knows how.


	2. Ikusaba Mukuro

**a/n: **Updated 1/7/13 to account for Mukuro having no scars. Thanks for the heads-up!

* * *

Mukuro thinks what she feels for her classmates is camaraderie.

If Kibougamine is an army, then her class is her platoon. Sixteen soldiers, sixteen lives entwined as one. They have lived as one, breathed as one, fought as one. And, if Junko has her way, they will die as one, despair as one. Mukuro has no objection. Junko was, is, and always would be her superior officer, and Mukuro would gladly kill the world for her. Her only regret in her life as a weapon is that, this time, she will be pointed towards those she once viewed as comrades.

Super Duper High School Sparring Partner, Oogami Sakura. Many a restless night has been spent sparring with Oogami, trading blow for blow in a way that only Oogami can manage. Not many can keep up with Mukuro. Oogami feels much the same, this Mukuro knows for a fact, because through their fists many unspoken words are communicated. Afterwards, they will retire in the comfortable silence between warriors who respect the other's strength, and these times are ones Mukuro treasures.

Super Duper High School Strategist, Celestia Ludenberg. Mukuro does not gamble and she does not play games, but games of war are really misnamed (because how can war be a game?) and so Mukuro indulges. It takes a long time for her to yield to Celes' urging, but eventually they play a simple game of chess. Mukuro loses. She blinks at the board once before replacing the pieces in their proper position, and Celes smirks and takes the first move before Mukuro even realizes it.

Super Duper High School Order, Ishimaru Kiyotaka. Many of the others had found his disposition for rules overbearing at first, but Mukuro, fresh to the scene of civilization, had thought him a source of comfort. Here was stability amidst the tumult of disorderly high-schoolers, and when Kiyotaka rounded them up for roll call, Mukuro had snapped to attention and given a proper salute. Ever since then, Kiyotaka has enlisted Mukuro's help in training the others to stand in perfectly straight lines.

Super Duper High School Morale Boost, Asahina Aoi. Mukuro can certainly appreciate the existence of the optimistic and cheerful. Even if she herself does not indulge in sharing in their radiance, having one of that nature is beneficial in raising the squad's morale. On a particularly dreadful rainy day, when Mukuro is sitting at a window sill and staring down, wondering how best to break a fall if she ever needed to fly out that window, Asahina scurries forward. Mukuro barely has time to react when a donut is shoved into her mouth.

Super Duper High School Fighter, Maizono Sayaka. Weak as she might be physically, Maizono is much stronger on the inside than anyone expects. Mukuro knows well enough not to underestimate anyone who has survived the trial by fire through which all idols must pass for their stardom, and Maizono's heart is as scarred as Mukuro's soul if not her body. They are really quite similar, in that way. Doggedly chasing their ideal, never mind what they will emerge as. Maizono is worthy of respect.

Super Duper High School Projectiles, Kuwata Leon. Mukuro can appreciate a decisive play and a good throwing arm. This one wouldn't be the recruit who looked to and fro while clutching a grenade with the pin pulled out. Kuwata has some maturing to do, but that will come in time. The boy has a decent enough heart, even if he doesn't know what to put his energy towards other than a raging libido. All it takes is a proper military regimen and people like Kuwata are straightened out.

Super Duper High School Forecast, Hagakure Yasuhiro. Not the most accurate weather forecast, but knowing the conditions of a battlefield is always important. Mukuro admits to having been one of his skeptics, but when Hagakure predicts that everyone has forgotten a major project is due and pulls out his own, Mukuro starts to pay more attention to the thirty percent of the time he is one hundred percent accurate. So far, it has not paid off. And perhaps it never will, but Mukuro never threw away her faulty radio either.

Super Duper High School Green Recruit, Fujisaki Chihiro. There is always the one recruit who is afraid, and timid, and shy, and Fujisaki fits the bill entirely. Not much can escape Mukuro's eyes. From their first meeting, Mukuro knows Fujisaki's secret, but she keeps it, because of a simple honed instinct. Protect your comrades. One day, Fujisaki will be ready. Pushing it will help nobody and only force Fujisaki to the precipice, and if there is one thing a soldier must never do, that is to sabotage his own troop.

Super Duper High School Volatile, Fukawa Touko. Mukuro isn't quite sure how she feels about her. The real Fukawa she has had little interaction with, but she also knows about Genocider. On one hand, Mukuro abhors such a loss of control, and especially when Fukawa's other half is a maniac with absolutely no sense of purpose behind her mindless carnage. Mukuro would deem Fukawa trash if not for a small spark of sympathy. Her split personality only exists because of an emptiness Fukawa feels, and Mukuro can empathize.

Super Duper High School Mask, Togami Byakuya. Togami is rude and standoffish and arrogant and condescending, but Mukuro knows that his mask is not really him. He is as good an actor as Junko, acting and acting until the mask is almost really him, but Mukuro sees the fraying outer edges not quite sticking entirely to his face. He puts on a good show for the siblings he has conquered. He does it to honor their memory, does everything with them in thought, with a one-track mind just like Mukuro's own devotion.

Super Duper High School Trainee, Yamada Hifumi. There's always one. The obese and unfit one, the one who lags behind the rest in training and flees in the face of danger, but Mukuro has seen many of these. There is nothing wrong with cowardice, even if Yamada is running not from bullets but from his own insecurity. Facing something like that is good, even, because if one day he conquers it, he will be all the stronger for it. Entire cultures achieve definition by conflict. Mukuro sees nothing wrong.

Super Duper High School Front Line, Oowada Mondo. The man who is first to charge and the last to retreat, that is who Oowada is. Beneath the gruff exterior is the large heart of someone with the best interests of his troop in mind, and Mukuro very readily recognizes him as a fellow soldier. Mukuro teaches him not to underestimate women though, when he makes a remark about not fighting females. When he finds himself flat on the floor with a mild concussion, Oowada is well educated.

Super Duper High School General, Kirigiri Kyouko. Mukuro can quite honestly admit to herself that she views Kirigiri as a superior office as well, if one on a slightly lesser level than Junko. Obviously, Junko's orders take precedence. But, Mukuro is ashamed to admit, sometimes she finds herself thinking that Kirigiri is a better commander. They are so evenly matched in genius, but one is logical and rational, the other prone to uncontrollable tantrums of wild emotion. Junko would lead them all to a death charge across mines, while Kirigiri would lead them to defuse it and then calmly walk over the duds.

Super Duper High School Luckster, Naegi Makoto. Luck is important. Naegi is very important. Because when his lips turn upward in his tentative, genuine smile, Mukuro finds her trained hands shaking. Because when his usually meek voice strengthens into his impassioned tone, Mukuro finds herself hanging onto every word. Naegi has always been the one to include her, even against her will. She turns her back whenever the others take a picture, and they do nothing to try to dissuade her, but Naegi alone will lower the camera and smile gently, ask her to smile, and Mukuro will do as he says as though his words are a spell. Luck. Naegi keeps none of his luck for himself. He spreads his luck out for others, he is luck personified, like a charm that Mukuro has found.

Except she can't grow dependent on something like that.

She can't. She's a soldier. All Mukuro ever brings is death and destruction and rivers of blood, and she cannot allow herself to soften herself like this, taint the others like this. So Mukuro decides, when Junko comes to her with despair, that she will free the others of her. It's because she loves them that she does this.

That's the only way she knows how.


End file.
